Disturbing pics: Removing bodies from Kedarnath proving to be a herculean task

Dehradun/Chandigarh: The Uttarakhand police and NDRF personnel are faced with a herculean task of removing dead bodies trapped around six to eight feet deep inside the debris in flood-ravaged town of Kedarnath.

At least 21 bodies, recovered from tonnes of debris in home to one of India's most revered shrines, were cremated on Thursday. This took the number of bodies disposed of at the shrine to 140 since the start of operations over a month ago.

The total number of bodies cremated in the entire Kedar valley since the start of operations has risen to 215.

The process of recovering the bodies from rubble lying close to the shrine was frequently hampered by bad weather and lack of equipment.

However, with a slight improvement in the weather yesterday, the exercise gained momentum at the shrine with the cremation of 21 bodies after necessary religious rituals and completion of other formalities like their DNA sampling, the police said.

Police and NDRF personnel are jointly carrying out the exercise under the supervision of DIG GS Martoliya.

Ornaments like rings, earrings, bangles and necklaces found on the bodies have been preserved to help their kin identify them, the police said.

Around a thousand were killed in the devastating floods, landslides and cloudbursts in the state on June 16 this year.

According to the Uttarakhand Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna, this kind of disaster has never happened in the Himalayan history.

He said it would "take a long time to rebuild Uttarakhand" and that no pilgrimage to Kedarnath would be possible for at least the next two years.

The situation in the hill state is "catastrophic". As per ActionAid, the Uttarakhand tragedy could turn out to be one of India's worst natural disasters.